Utah Cultural Advocacy Alliance Grade: A+ (100%)

  • Candidate Name: Tim Henney
  • Your Municipality: Park City
  • Elected office for which you are running: Council

Question 1: Should government be involved in funding the arts and humanities?
Yes

Question 2: Have you had a personal experience with arts, culture, or humanities that have had an impact on your life?
Yes

3b // Optional, explain your experience.
I have two children, 29 & 27 years of age, who are both extremely creative and artistic. I also believe most everyone has a creative gene in their DNA but it is not always expressed in mainstream or traditional modes we recognize as art.

Question 3: Do you support public funding for city and county arts councils who then re-grant that money to local arts and humanities organizations?
Yes

3b // Optional, explain why or why not.
In Park City we have successfully done so through various means including our Summit County and Park City Art Council.

Question 4: Do you support Percent for Art programs, which designate 1% of public building costs for public art that are included within that building? Currently, only 8 Utah municipalities have such a program.
Yes

4b // Optional, explain why or why not.
We have just such a program in Park City which has been very successful in placing art in public places.

Question 5: Do you support having a Percent-for-Art program in your own municipality?
Yes

5b // Optional, explain why or why not.
We have one.

Question 6: Do you consider the arts and cultural sector an economic driver in Utah?
Yes

6b // Optional, explain why or why not.
We see tremendous economic benefit in our town of Park City from Sundance Film Festival, Kimball Art Festival, Park City Institute programming, Concerts at Deer Valley, etc.

Question 7: 32 municipalities have a RAP (recreation, arts, and parks) type tax to help support cultural organizations in their communities. Would you support a RAP type tax such as this in your own municipality? If your municipality already has such a local option sales RAP-type sales tax and you support it, answer yes.
Yes

7b // Optional, explain your experience.
We already have one and it is great!

Question 8: Municipalities can facilitate partnerships between cultural organizations and the local tourism sector to boost the local economy. Do you support this? Optional, explain why or why not. 
Yes

8b // Optional, explain why or why not. 
See next question and answer.

Question 9: Municipal governments can create Cultural Districts - with or without tax incentives. Governments sometimes fund these via bed or tourism taxes within the Cultural District boundaries, but it can be done within municipal budgets fairly cheaply. Is this something you would support?
Yes

9b // Optional, explain why or why not. 
In Park City we are currently creating an Art & Culture District in an area of town that is proposed for redevelopment by the private sector. The municipal government has partnered with The Sundance Institute and The Kimball Art Center to jointly redevelop a 5.25 acre parcel of land in the heart of Park City into an Art & Culture District. The City passed a 1% transient room tax to pay for the project, both Sundance and Kimball will buy their parcel of land and design their buildings.